


Peanut m&m's

by Gaelic_Bread



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: ??? to Friends to Lovers, Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - Mortal, Annabeth is a tad spoiled, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Injury, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POC Percy Jackson, Percy's fluent in Spanish, Percy's not a gamer but he'd like to be, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:34:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 14,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27430573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gaelic_Bread/pseuds/Gaelic_Bread
Summary: A researcher's daughter begrudgingly comes to work with her father. And spots a boy. There's a bit of a rocky start. And he's hiding something. But that doesn't matter until it does. First, she's got to get her family off her back.Updates every Wednesday
Relationships: Annabeth Chase & Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase & Thalia Grace, Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood, Thalia Grace & Percy Jackson
Comments: 40
Kudos: 88





	1. September - Percy I

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the prompt “You work at a museum and I like to come by a lot in my free time and wait why do you seem to follow me from exhibit to exhibit” but I changed a lot.
> 
> The chapters will alternate POV's between Percy and Annabeth, so this first one might not match the summary, but we'll get there :) Also my writing gets marginally better over time...
> 
> I'll put trigger warnings (if applicable) at the beginning of each chapter.

_"No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change._

_Thy pyramids built up with newer might_

_To me are nothing novel, nothing strange;_

_They are but dressings of a former sight"_

_\- William_ _Shakespeare_

Part 1 : A Former Sight

His boots land with a thud on the pavement, and he brings his hands up to undo the top button of his polo. The leaves are still green. The air still warm. He wishes that they were allowed to wear shorts to school. No matter, he has a change of clothes in his backpack. He just has to get to the museum first.

It’s pretty much a straight shot down 84th to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In eighth grade, his homeroom had taken a field trip there. He’d gotten in trouble when a girl fell in the fountain. Which didn’t really make much sense, because he’d just been sitting there. But she fell in, and screamed his name, and then he’d had detention for a week.

However, the thing that had stuck with him most about the trip was the entry fee. It could be anything. He had seen a woman pass over a twenty dollar bill. A college student had dropped a quarter in the box. He could get in for a penny. So he does. All of the time.

He passes a five dollar bill to the cart vender and waits patiently for his change, fingering the yellow wrapper. The color isn’t neon, but it isn’t deep either. He can feel the round pieces of candy inside. A shard of the candy coating crunches. One of the m&m’s must be broken.

“Niño, niño, hey.” The man is sticking his hand out of the window of the cart. His hands are tanned and rough. Percy can smell hand sanitizer and see dirt under the nails. When he takes the money from the man, his hands are warm. They seem strong, but nice.

“Lo siento, gracias.”

He starts walking again, counting the change. Three one dollar bills and a penny. Perfect.

The steps are crowded. Tourists coming in. School groups leaving. College students doing both. He weaves his way through the crowd and into the doors, already slinging his backpack off his shoulders for security to check. He passes through without comment. This guard must be new. The door guards always say hi to him.

His penny drops into the acrylic box with a clink, and the attendant passes him a metal clip. Today it’s blue. His favorite. He folds it around the collar of his shirt. There’s a possibility that this day might be good.

In the next bathroom stall, he can hear a little boy talking animatedly with his father. The man responds good naturedly. He laughs at the nonsensical knock-knock joke. Percy watches their feet.

The Egypian Wing is one of the most popular in the museum. The closest restroom to the entrance is the one behind the Tomb of Perneb, which means he always starts there when he comes from school. But usually, he doubles back to the great hall, the busiest spot in the museum. Some days he would just tuck into a corner or crevice and watch all of the people, but not today.

Undoubtedly, the best place to do homework is Gallery 607. The room is long, and painted a dark grey. The parquet floors host several dark wood benches, and the only people who spend considerable time there are students and artists. Apparently Venetian Sixteenth-Century Paintings aren’t in big demand. Tourists and children stream through the room infrequently, giving the gilded framed paintings a quick glance before moving on. The ceiling is made of a foggy glass, so during the day it’s well lit, and in the evenings, it hosts a comforting shroud of darkness.

Today, that’s the goal. But there are a lot of places to pass on the way there. He could walk through the Byzantine Hall, up the stairs, and straight forward to 607. Or… he could go through the Greek wing. Up the stairs, through the photography rooms, and into the giant section of European paintings.

Percy approaches the art in the MET with something between leisure and nonchalance. Other people he sees rush from room to room. Or move at a snail's pace, trying to absorb the piece they look at. He’s different from everybody else there in that aspect. He isn’t trying to see it all. He isn’t there for a particular piece. And he doesn’t work there. He knows he’ll be there again the next day. He can afford to stream past or take his time.

Guilty pleasure is not the right word for whatever the Greek and Roman exhibits are to Percy. A detour. An impulse. An indulgence. Yes. The only guilt to it is that they aren’t even his favorite. There’s just something about these exhibits that’s indescribably comforting to him. It’s not the cozyness of Africa, Oceana, and the Americas section, or the protecting feel of standing in the Medieval art. It’s something like floating on your back in the middle of an empty pool.

Gallery 607 is empty when he gets there. The sun is still high in the sky so the room is well lit. And the museum has air conditioning so it’s quite cold. The only issue with this gallery is that it has six entrances and exits, so there is no perfect way to sit. He chooses the middle bench and faces the largest painting as he spreads his school work out. His earbuds are all tangled up from being shoved in his pocket, and he spends five minutes carefully undoing the knots, running the pads of his fingers along the rubber methodically.

His phone is not new, but it is in good condition. The screen shines as he taps lightly on it, spending his time carefully selecting the best soundtrack for getting things done. Usually he would default to video game music, which has a knack for keeping him focused, but Grover’s updated their shared playlist, so he puts it on the default shuffle mode and pulls out his math homework.

He can feel the unread play for english burning a hole in his backpack, but he puts it off to finish everything else first. When he’s finally given up on algebra two, he turns to french, whispering translations under his breath to get the pronunciation right “L’ecole, le professor, tarea- shit. Devoirs, devoirs, devoirs.” Stupid translations, his brain always gets muddled.

On the second page of translations his phone rings. Loud and tinny in the nearly empty room, he scrambles for it before the old white man on the opposite end of the room can glare at him. “Mama?”

“Ah, good, you picked up.”

“I always pick up.”

“Mmm-hmm.” She sounds preoccupied.

“Mom?”

“Yes?” She chimes. He can hear shuffling in the background.

“You called me?”

“Oh, yes, right. I’m picking up an extra shift so I won’t be home tonight.” Percy feels his face fall but he forces his tone to something not-miserable.

“Okay.”

“There’s some tamales in the fridge, the ones from Mrs. Desoto.” Percy bites his lip, dreading for the answer to his next question.

“And did he go to work today?” On a good day the answer would be yes. The good day where Percy could go back to the apartment, reheat food, and then eat in the hall with Nigel, or on the fire escape.

“I dunno hun. I left pretty early this morning.” She always did.

“Okay.”

“I’ve got to go now.” He can hear more papers shuffling in the background. “But why don’t we get breakfast together tomorrow?”

“Yeah, sure. Love you.”

“I love you too, Percy.” The call drops. He bites his pencil.

“No es el papel, pero es le papier.” He writes it down.

He spends the time to carefully pack away his things in his backpack before leaving. There are seven peanut M&M’s left in the packet, and he throws one in the air, catching it in his mouth as he secrues his bag on his back. The museum is mostly empty.

He hears the guard lock the door behind him, and stands on the white steps, popping another m&m in his mouth. The sun is setting, the air now cool, and he extracts his standard issue zip-up from his bag. Rolling on the balls of his feet before starting the journey back to the apartment. He jumps up and down a few times, his feet slap the stone, and before too long passes, he begins.

86th street station is by no means a crap hole. No subway station is clean, you certainly should never eat food off of the floor, or the benches and walls for that matter, but it’s large, and there are some tile murals, and it has escalators and an elevator.

He swipes his card and passes through the turnstile. The evening rush is petering out at this point, and he finds a seat on the 6. There are a few other kids his age in the car, public school kids, if he had to guess, but he definitely looks like a public school kid. He’s not even sure he could call himself a private school kid. More like a hodgepodge school kid at this point.

He only has to sit through one stop before he’s at 103rd street station. It’s like every other average station in the city. A filthy cement platform with black spots of gum and white tiled walls with advertisements. He steps out of the station and waits for the light at the corner. He lets out a deep breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. Back in East Harlem.


	2. September - Annabeth I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annabeth begrudgingly comes to the museum.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No tw this chapter, I did write five paragraphs of Annabeth becoming obsessed though.

“There is no discussion Annabeth. You are coming to the museum with me when you are done with school.” 

“Why can’t I just go home and do my work?” She’s very aware that she’s whining but elects to ignore it.

“I’ve already told you, Helen is taking the boys to a birthday party, and neither of us have the time to pick you up and drive you home.”

“I could just take the subway.”

“That’s not an option.” She kicks the wall. She bets she’s the only fifteen year old in all of New York City not allowed to take the subway by herself. “I’ll see you at 4:00.” The call drops.

Annabeth is still in a sour mood when four o’clock rolls around. She stalks to her father’s BMW arms crossed and sits in the passenger seat with a huff.

“Nice to see you too.” Frederick says. She pointedly stares out the window.

New York is not her favorite. The traffic is slow and tedious, even if she isn’t the one driving, and she doesn’t much like the smell. In Virgina their car could drive at  _ actual _ speeds and she could let the outdoors blur together. That rarely ever happens here.

One large pro in her New York column is the architecture. So while she may not appreciate all, or even most, of the art in the MET, the building more than makes up for it. She drops her backpack in her dad’s office before leaving to find the perfect arch. 

In the Greek Wing, she picks a deserted corner to sit in and observe the arches. On her phone she brushes her finger across the screen, sketching the shapes over and over again. Trying to capture the look in simplistic detail is difficult, she’s drawing the same arch for the fifth time when the lines start blurring together. 

She stands and stretches from side to side, waiting for the tell tale pops that her back makes. She straightens her skirt and flexes her feet, giving her mind time to refocus. Drawing is meditative once she gets in the flow, and it always takes a while to exit the coffee shop in her mind. Sometimes she doesn’t want to leave, she could stay in the warm room with the smell of roasted coffee beans and let her body go numb, like a dormant volcano.

The crowd is starting to thin out, and she decides to wander. She may not come very often, although she’s confident she spends more time here than any other fifteen year old, but she knows the staff pretty well. Which, if she’s being honest, is not always appreciated. She skirts around the guards to avoid conversation.

By the time she is on the second floor the goal of her wandering has become finding a room with the least amount of people. The first doorway when she comes off of the main staircase is the entrance to the European Painting section, and in her opinion, this many european paintings is unnecessary. The place is huge. When her dad first got his job here, she had memorized the map to the MET and if she remembers correctly, there are 43 galleries for european paintings alone.

There are a dozen people spread out in the rooms she strolls through, eerily silent as they each obsessively study their own painting. What makes it eerie is that she can hear someone talking somewhere, in French no less. She’s almost exited the room when she realizes this is where the French is coming from. It’s not the old man opposite of her, it’s… 

The boy could be the subject of an oil painting. 

Under the skylights and mellow lighting his skin is bronze. His hair is the night sky. The folds in his shirt are waves crashing on the shore with every breath. The tapping of his foot, a stone skipping across water.

Sitting in this room, cross legged, papers spread out on the bench, hunched over a notebook, Annabeth thinks she’s found the one person who  _ belongs _ here. He scratches out something in pencil and winds the cord of his earbuds around his finger. Under his breath there are french words. His tongue ghosts over his lips as he erases something. He absently pops a peanut m&m into his mouth.

Maybe, just maybe, she could stare at this boy for forever. The angles that make up his nose and jaw. There’s a scar from just below his cheek trailing down his neck. Beautiful asymmetry. Annabeth has a rule against drawing people. Partially because she hates it, and partially because they never look right. What’s the point of drawing someone if she can’t capture them perfectly? She would try for this boy and his beautiful eyelashes.

The room explodes with the obnoxious sound of a ringing phone, and Annabeth wants to glare at the old man for ruining her moment of enjoyment. Before she can look across the room the boy is scrambling for his phone. Her annoyance vanishes.

And  _ oh _ . 

His eyes. Would it be cheesy to say that they look like an ocean? A real ocean. Not a perfect blue, but a dark swirling green. Would it be chilché to say that she could drown in them? A serene death. Without thrashing about, a pure end. Would it be tacky to say that her life is in them? Her real life. The one with imperfections, with arguments. 

She glimpses them for less than a second. He’s whipping his head around looking at the man, apologetically, she assumes. He doesn’t see her. 

“¿Mama?”

At this moment Annabeth knows she’s done for. She turns and goes through the closest doorway. A boy who calls his mother “Mama”. A boy with ocean eyes. A boy with dark skin and darker hair. A boy with worn clothes, worn nails, worn earbuds. A boy that speaks French. How could she spend another second with him without combusting?

“You’re quiet.” 

“I didn’t talk on the way to the museum either.” She points out.

“Usually you’re over it by the time we are heading home.” 

She hates that he’s right.

“Just thinking.”

“Anything interesting?”

“No.” She lies. 

He is interesting, The Boy. The papers placed around him. The peanut m&m’s. The tapping of his foot. Her brain analyzes everything she can remember, creating a model of The Boy in her head. Everything she knows about him. How much she wants to be back at the museum, watching him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this looked longer on google docs


	3. September - Percy II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Can you really blame him for assuming this?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW mentions of past injuries  
> TW racism
> 
> also some swearing

One thing Percy finds really cool about the MET is that they have rooms of rooms. They have rooms. They have rooms in rooms. He’s never been able to explain it without being incredibly confusing at first. They have put historical rooms inside and you can look at them. Like the Frank Loyd Wright room. He doesn’t know much about architecture, but he knows a fair bit about Frank Loyd Wright, and no matter how much or little he knows about architecture, he knows he loves the stained glass windows made of warm colored rhombuses. 

The only issue is that there is  _ always _ somebody in that room, so he doesn’t get to spend as much time in there as he would like. Also there are no benches on the railed walkway that goes into the room. So he sits outside in a corner where people stare at him doing homework and little kids wave at him.

Homework is never less greuling. He’d rather be at the skatepark with Grover, or playing basketball with Nigel. Some might think that skating with Grover wouldn’t be much fun, given that he’s cautious so he doesn’t have to use his crutches, but his sense of humor and support more than make up for it. He’s Percy’s best friend in the entire world. Which really isn’t saying much because he only has Grover, Nigel--his neighbor/friend, and Thalia--his not quite/maybe cousin?

Percy also met Grover in a confusing situation. In that they met twice. First when they were in a shared hospital ward, and then two years later at Percy’s first middle school. In Percy’s opinion, meeting someone when you have a severe concussion shouldn’t count, but Grover’s muscular disease does not affect his memory, and he loves to tease Percy about it. 

Grover really tried to help Percy in school, but it just didn’t stick. The next year Grover had stayed at Yancy, and Percy was sent to some bullshit all boys military school in the middle of Manhattan, which was practically an oxymoron. Luckily they had never fallen out of touch.

Grover would want him to finish his homework so they could hang out over the weekend. So back to homework it is. Well it would be back to homework if Percy could concentrate. And he could concentrate if the new guard wasn’t standing in the corner. 

It had taken a year of coming every single day the museum was open for Percy and the guards to not only become comfortable with each other, but to know each other. Like how Terry had twin daughters named after some tv show, and how Michelle had gotten an embroidered leather jacket for her birthday.

Maybe he hadn’t cultivated these relationships on purpose, but it was nice to know that when some huffy Karen tried to get him kicked out of the museum for sitting on the floor that the staff would have his back. So he might count the footsteps of the new guard until he leaves the room.

Loretta replaces him, which is a godsend because Loretta always tosses him a Hershey's Kiss. The silver wrapped chocolate makes a soft thud as it hits his head and drops to the floor. He can hear Loretta laugh.

“Espero que tu frente le guste el chocolate.”

He glares at her before his face splits into a grin.

With the milk chocolate in his cheek, homework becomes a little more bearable. He speeds through the french, because even with his dyslexia languages are ten times easier than almost every other thing he could learn. It’s not too different from Spanish either, but sometimes his teacher does get frustrated when his sentences are a mix of languages. 

The downside to going to a mostly white private school is that even though he can speak more languages than most of the other students, being fluent in Spanish makes people dislike him more. Well, that’s not the only downside. There are slurs. And being alone. And a ton of other shit he doesn’t want to go into. But these kids are struggling through Spanish 1 and the teachers are proud of them, and he knows Spanish  _ and  _ is learning French, but he still gets glared at.

The next time he looks up from his work there is a blonde girl talking to Loretta. She looks impatient and Percy immediately dislikes her. Who could dislike Loretta, who has a conversation with Loretta and doesn’t love her instantly. Loretta who embroiders gifts for all of her friends and babysits for her step-sister and will tell Percy what the word he’s having trouble with is. 

Blonde Girl is responding to Loretta listlessly, and they are just far away enough where Percy cannot hear them, but he can tell that Blonde Girl is giving short answers. He gives himself a second to look her over now, he’s never been one to let his first impressions rule him. Well, that’s not true. He knew Grover was a good person the second they met, the same way he knew Gabe wasn’t. But he tries, that’s what his mom says is important, trying.

She has sandy blonde hair that curls like stretched out plastic ribbon and skin the color of old book pages. There are the remnants of freckles on her face, like she used to spend a lot of time outdoors but doesn’t anymore. And she is wearing knee high white socks, a black skirt, and blue button up. Private school kid, and with the way she’s treating Loretta, a rich one.

Blonde Girl looks directly at Percy. Their eyes catch for a second, and then she turns back to Loretta, finally acting as if her words have zest. Oh. God, why can’t one space remain unruined for him. The new security guard is one thing, but this girl, this girl talking to Loretta because he’s sitting out of the damn way doing his work quietly, this girl who feels entitled enough to ask him to be removed. 

He hopes she rots. Her stupid curls can turn into dead wheat, and her skin can turn to peeling bark, and her freckles can turn to maggots, and she can let the earth take her and the earth will destroy her. 

His face is hot like the grills on a gas stove and he looks down with the ferocity that the refrigerator door gets slammed. It doesn’t stop, the rage. When he watches her feet walk away it’s still there. It lurks. It’s behind him, looking over his shoulder as his hand shakes out a backwards letter. It fills his ears like the disapproving “Hm.” that follows. 

It’s not gone when he’s on the subway going to the apartment later. It’s in the way the eyes of the MTA cops follow him. The way the scanner rejects his metrocard with a twangy beep. The way the white woman glares at him after he jumps the turnstyle. The way the old man doesn’t try to keep the car door open for him. 

But the rage, not only is it all around him, it’s in him. It’s building up inside him, and he knows it. He hates it. When he was little, Sally sent him to preschool. Actually she sent him to several preschools because he never seemed to last more than a few months. But at one of them, they had someone come in and teach about reservoirs. A place where water collects and becomes a body of water because it’s kept in using a dam. 

The trick with dams, is that they let a little of the water out, and they use it to create electricity. So if his anger is water… He glares at the old man, and at least the old man has the decency to look ashamed.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes Percy hates Annabeth
> 
> Thank you to my friend Leo, who translated into Spanish for me, I know it was a weird request.


	4. September - Annabeth II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annabeth has a day full of winning interactions /s

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -some light swearing  
> -questionable family life
> 
> we're getting deeper into the plot and im excited to keep it up

The third time she sees The Boy she’s passing through one of the outer galleries of the Robert Lehman Collection. Actually, she’s not even passing  _ through _ , she’s passing  _ by _ . 

She’s thinking about the most recent fight between her and Helen. One that she would’ve won if she hadn’t had to go to school. And she wouldn’t have had to go to school that early if she was allowed to take the subway, which was faster than car. She felt as if a lemon rind was hanging back by her molars all day. This feeling had only increased since her father informed her that she would be coming to work with him after school. That bitterness eating at her stomach lining is what had brought her to walking listlessly around the museum, unable to concentrate on school work or appreciate architecture.

Maybe it was luck, or justice, or God, that made her turn her head a fraction to the right. More likely, it was the crick in her neck she had developed by leaning against the window of her father’s car. 

Out of the corner of her eye she catches a glimpse of raven hair. The next thing she sees is something slightly textured and off-white. This thing, she realises belatedly, is the door frame. The door frame that her head soon becomes well acquainted with. There’s a soft smack. She takes a step back, rubbing her forehead.

“Shit.”

The Boy turns towards her noise. She curses again, internally. 

Well, his eyes are still pretty. At least when she dies of embarrassment she can die looking at his eyes. Part of her is telling her to just look into his eyes and memorize his irises. The other part, the majority, is telling her to run away before she makes a larger fool of herself. 

So she does what any self-respecting fifteen year old girl who just humiliated herself in front of her crush would do, turns on her heel and walks as far away from him as she can get. Her brain is reeling at that interaction. The first time he looks at her, the first time they make eye contact, however brief, and it’s because she walked into a wall.

He looked cute, she decides, all surprised like that. Of course she hadn’t seen much, having been too busy being in pain. When she had looked at him his hair had been swaying a bit, like it had floofed out when he spun around. His eyes bright, and cheeks rosy.

On the other hand, she was wearing her school uniform. One of the knee socks had slipped down, and her untucked shirt revealed a mustard stain from one of her devilish friends during lunch. She can feel her hair heavy on her head, tangled and falling out of it’s bun.

The rest of the time passes quickly in her own head, she watches the people walking in central park. The leaves are still green, and she sighs, she’s always hated summer. Through the small windows of the staff dining hall she sees the sun lower in the sky. Just when the blue tints orange, her father texts saying it’s time to go. 

Her backpack is sitting on the carpeted floor of her father’s office. As she reaches down to get it, she notices that her socks are still uneven. Stubbornly she pulls the left one down too. Maybe in protest. 

Most of the bitterness has seeped out of her body right now. Or, the bitterness towards her father at least. Frederick plays jazz in the car, and raindrops patter against the car window, it feels like one of those perfect scenes from a movie. She stretches her legs out, letting her muscles pull taught, so when she releases them they feel light and airy. She listens as her father talks about whatever research he is doing now.

All of the tension returns to her shoulders when she steps through the threshold of the Chase house. It’s not the house per se. The house is fine, it’s probably even nice, she just doesn’t care much for it. Three stories and a basement, painted a pale yellow in the part of Queens that people who live in Manhattan would consider the suburbs. 

Her mind always fights itself in these times. The times when her and her father return to the house together. If she comes in first, she has to face Helen first, but if she’s fast she can get up the stairs and hide in her room until dinner. If she comes in second, she can use her dad’s body to shield herself, she might be able to slip away unnoticed.

Tonight she has no such luck. Helen is standing in the living room, just off the entrance, supervising Matthew and Bobby as they play video games.

“I’m home!” Frederick calls, sing-songy, as they turn the corner.

Helen comes forward and kisses Frederick on the cheek, before looking at Annabeth and letting a  _ tsk _ escape her lips.

“What?”

“Oh nothing sweetie, just your socks.”

The way she says ‘sweetie’ is just sticky like corn syrup. Sugary and gross looking and bad for you. Helen rarely ever refers to Annabeth by her name, and it feels like some strange cruelty. There’s something wrong about it but Annabeth doesn’t quite know what. Maybe it’s just another way her step-mother is seemingly trying to erase her.

Annabeth does not understand a single thing about her step-mother. She isn’t a neat freak. Her half-brothers’ legos are strewn across the rug, and Helen’s own shoes are crooked by the door. Her father’s jumper is on the rocking chair where he left it last night. And Helen doesn’t have a job, she’s a fucking  _ house-wife _ . She’s had all day to put these things away, and she didn’t, so  _ they _ obviously don’t bother her.

Yet Annabeth’s socks do. Suddenly they feel heavy, bunched around her ankles. She squares her jaw. “Is something wrong with them?”

“It’s just that they are knee-socks.”

Annabeth looks Helen pointedly in the eyes, letting her squirm a little in the silence.

“They’re socks,” Annabeth says at last “They’re on my feet.”

“Yes they are.” Helen says, before turning and walking away and into the kitchen.

  
_ And there goes another winning interaction _ , Annabeth thinks to herself as she lugs her backpack up the stairs and into her room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I updated the chapter number information to reflect how many chapters there will actually be. This number might fluctuate a little based on what actually needs to happen and what I cut over time.
> 
> I hope you liked it


	5. September - Percy III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Percy starts his weekend roughly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Trigger Warnings* - Something akin to a panic attack
> 
> \- I'll have the section marked as ***___*** at the beginning and end and a summary in the notes of the next chapter if you need to skip (however my chapters aren't long so it's a sizable portion)  
> \- I'm sorry about short chapters, I could reconfigure them to be longer but then updates would take even longer. Let me know what you want.

It is Friday. Probably the best day of any week. Percy’s weekends are never particularly good, but there is always the hope that they could be. Really, he still spends his weekends at the museum, but his mom’s shifts start later and end earlier, so usually they can eat breakfast and dinner together. Breakfast is usually pretty good, dinner… well that depends.

It’s six-thirty, which means the museum is closing in half an hour, the announcement has already come over the loudspeakers. He’s sitting in the corner of the largest room of the American Wing, stradling and leaning forward, to stretch his legs and hips. A security guard is standing by a pillar, the invisible line dividing the café from the rest of the museum. It’s the new one, not a guard Percy is particularly familiar with, he’s a pretty muscular white guy with blond hair, stubble, and a jagged scar, but if Percy put effort in he could probably remember his name.

He feels a click in his hips, like the last correct digit in a combination lock, and flexes his legs a few more times, letting himself fall back against the border of the statue garden and look around the mostly empty room. He can see the sky through the glass ceiling, a few sun rays land on his face and he shields his eyes.

He can also hear someone walking somewhere out of view and he’s briefly tempted to turn around. Instead he lets his brain do the work, evaluating footsteps. It’s kind of a hobby of his, deducing shoes and gait and the like, a hobby that stems from a dark twisted place, but he ignores that.

The steps are fast, so someone who is in a hurry or someone who is young or someone who has shorter legs. Or all three. Second, the shoes are making a clacking sound against the stone floor, but not a click-clacking sound, so it’s not high heels. Nice shoes though, the sounds are crisp, which means a hard sole, probably untextured. Impractical. Women’s shoes are usually the most impractical, so it’s a woman. The sounds are getting closer too, is it possible that this person is going to cross the indoor statue garden? 

***___***

If he hadn’t shielded his eyes from the sun he would have missed her, as it was he almost did. She’s almost all the way across when she exits his blindspot. His jaw clenches a miniscule amount and he watches dumbly as The Girl starts talking seriously with the guard. The security guard, Percy’s pretty sure his name is Mike, squares his shoulders and repositions his feet to a sturdier stance. By the time Probably-Mike has crossed his arms Percy is throwing on his backpack. 

Once he’s exited to the Arms and Armor exhibit he presses his back against the wall--generally not the best idea in a museum, but the artifacts are protected in cases so he should be free of alarms. There is chain that has tightened around his chest and his mind races for strategies to “cool the fuck down” as Thalia would say. He draws blank after blank before he finally gives up on calming down. The only thing that matters right now is getting out of here.

He slows his run to a speed walk as he moves through the next section. His footsteps echo on the tile floor. The dark room sucks the warmth out of his body in a way he doesn’t appreciate. It’s somehow making him more anxious. It’s almost a straight shot to the exit, only one left turn and he-

“Sorry, sorry!” His voice carries in the empty room, and Percy scrambles away from whoever he just walked straight into. “It’s my fault, sorry.” 

“Hey Percy, está bien.” Loretta grabs his shoulders just as he’s about to duck away. “Are you- are you alright?” She asks, and Percy doesn’t want to answer that. If he’s learned anything from adults it’s that _I don’t know_ isn’t an acceptable answer.

“Haha, yeah, claro.” He laughs, scratching the back of his neck.

“Those floors must be really interesting, ¿eh?”

“¿Qué? Oh, lo siento .” He looks up to face her, hoping his face doesn’t give him away. 

“You don’t need to apologize so much, ¿sabes? It was just as much my fault as yours” She looks at him for a second, “Actually, scratch that, es mi culpa, not yours. I should pay more attention.” 

Percy doesn’t know how to respond to that, he wants to scream that it's _his_ fault, he’s the one that messes everything up. Loretta’s job is literally to pay attention, she’s got to be good at it, so how can this possibly be her fault? He can feel the chain squeezing around him with a renewed vigor, but her expression is warm and soft like butter. Loretta looks at him brown eyes on green for a long moment, and then she pats his shoulder and drops a chocolate in his hand.

“You’ll be alright kiddo.” 

When she’s well and truly out of earshot he releases the breath he had been holding. He knows his shoulders are shaking and he busies his hands with taking off the silver wrapper. If he can just imagine that Thalia is behind him, looking over his head, pressing her hand against his shoulder blade, watching out for him... He controls his breathing and takes a measured step forward. 

***___***

Once he’s outside things slow. He sucks in a deep breath of the summer-autumn air and can feel it travelling throughout his body like a cold glass of water on an excruciatingly hot day. His fingers itch for something to do and he draws his phone and earbuds out of his pocket, he needs something to calm down. 

Its piano music that travels up the white cable and into his ears as he walks down the crowded grey sidewalks of New York, and he can feel his pulse return to average as the steady piano keys continue. The song is sad in a way that calms him down. He knows at some point that acknowledging that things suck will stop making him feel this tiny bit better, but it’s working for now, so he reminds himself to remove his hands from his pockets and keeps moving along. Venom is pumping through his veins, joining the chain, trying to make its way to his heart and brain. For now he can barely feel it.

On Saturday morning he wakes up to a single text from his mom on his phone: “Sorry, I can’t do breakfast this weekend. I’m picking up some extra shifts for Sam.” His phone bounces as he drops it on the mattress and he turns towards the curtainless window, watching the sun rise over the New York skyline.


	6. September - Annabeth III

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No trigger warnings this chapter
> 
> Summary of the potentially triggering part of the last chapter:  
> Annabeth walked into the same gallery as Percy and started to talk to a guard (Percy's pretty sure his name is Mike). He's scared that Annabeth is trying to get him in trouble, he starts panicking and leaves. Then he runs into Loretta and she gives him some chocolate.

It was utterly and completely on accident. Annabeth will swear that for the rest of her life, and everyone will laugh and shake their heads and smirk at her. 

She was sitting on a bench in the European paintings section and he walked in. It is very possible that this is the gallery she first saw him in, but she definitely didn’t go to sit there on purpose. No, she had been annoyed at her dad, annoyed that she had to waste yet another afternoon at the museum, and she had stalked off to a random gallery.

Of course the more you use a pathway in your brain the more it wants to use it, but if she did come to the room on purpose, it was subconsciously. Because why would she want to see The Boy when she was upset and angry? Surely not to make her feel better.

She is sitting in suffocating silence alone on the dark mahogany bench. The heaviness of the quiet is what is keeping the room from buzzing with her anger, pressing it down so it can’t burst a hole through the glass ceiling. She can hear footsteps approaching. Before she can manage another thought he is standing a yard away from her.

He glances around the room quickly, eyes skirting over Annabeth, before he stops in front of a painting. She’s not sure that he was really looking for anything, the way his gaze went right through her. Like he was looking at a different plane of existence. Annabeth’s next fifteen minutes pass like this: watching him out of the corner of her eye, looking away whenever he turns, risking a couple seconds of watching when his back is towards her.

He’s made his way across the gallery, looked at every painting, and she knows he’s going to leave now. He will step out of the gallery and then Annabeth will be caught in the feeling that she’ll never get to see him again. Maybe it was her unfortunately hormonal brain, or the lack of impulse control that she usually hides, but she makes what soon she will regard as the worst decision in her life. Her feet are moving before she even admits it to herself. She’s going to follow him.

Lately, when she’s seen him she’s been trying not to pay as much attention. Annabeth has never had much luck in the friends and family department. Sure, she has a lot of friends at school, and sure she loves her family, but whenever things feel permanent between her and someone else, the rug seems to be pulled out from under her. 

She had her mom and her dad, and then they got divorced. She had her dad, and then he got remarried. She had her best friend Malcom, and then they moved. Now she has Silena, Thalia, and Luke, and not really anyone else. Getting too close to this boy, a boy who doesn’t even know she exists, is dangerous. Becoming attached and then torn apart seems lethal. 

Now, following him around the museum, it seems like staying away from him would hurt her just as much. She stays a few meters behind him, looking at her phone whenever she thinks he might spot her. Briefly, she is tempted to walk up to him, to introduce herself. There is far too much risk involved in that, though. She pulls herself back. Things like this are far better when she doesn’t get involved, then she can’t screw them up.

This isn’t the closest they’ve ever been, yet he remains as captivating as ever. His backpack hangs off of one shoulder as he examines each painting, he’s wearing black boots, jeans, and a navy sweatshirt that she can catch a glimpse of a logo in. It’s a weird combination, surely. The mix of clean, pressed, clothes, along with some that look so old that they might be falling apart at the seams. 

However, the most interesting thing about him is his uncanny ability to seem still while he’s constantly moving. She watches the blue ballpoint pen on its journey. First it’s in his hand, where he repeatedly removes the cap. Then he shoves it in his back pocket before spinning it around his fingers and tucking it behind his ear. And all the while he gives the impression of a model student, sitting in class quietly, paying full attention to the professor. His upper body doesn’t shift, it’s as if his arms are a separate entity.

Every once and a while he’ll stuff the pen in his pocket and trade it for a crumpled yellow bag, peanut m&m’s. Just like he had the day that they met. She can’t help but smile at this. Here is a boy that she doesn’t know, but also knows well enough to remember what he was eating the day they first met. Or the day she first saw him, she supposes they haven’t actually met. 

After an hour she does find herself becoming less alert. Simply being in his presence brings a certain kind of calm. Whenever he moves to the next room she follows, staying out of his eyesight, but otherwise she retreats into her phone. She has several unopened snapchats, one is from Luke, he’s on shift downstairs, but most are from one of her school friends, Silena. 

Silena is an outrageously beautiful girl. She radiates beauty in an effortless way, even though Annabeth knows she puts a lot of time into her appearance. Like Annabeth, she lives is Queens, with her half sister. Her and Annabeth often find themselves in remarkably deep conversations with no memory of how they arrived there. But, above all, she can tell when Annabeth is hiding something.

Annabeth dutifully listens to the rant Silena left her about some music elective before opening the last snap, a flawless selfie taken during golden hour. Is it already that late? Annabeth responds with her own sloppy selfie, half of her face out of frame. Silena gets back to her immediately, a photo of herself with her crush blurred and moving out of frame. Normally Annabeth would respond by freaking out with Silena about her crush, however Silena had added a different message to her photo: “What are you hiding Chase?”

Annabeth responds with an ever so casual “What do you mean???” but Silena isn’t taking any of her shit today. “Cut the crap Annabeth, you only hide your face when you’re up to something” Briefly, Annabeth is overcome by love for her friend, who somehow knows mannerisms that even Annabeth doesn’t know about.

Still, she isn’t ready to tell anybody about this boy and whatever her feelings towards him might be. “Literally, I’m not doing anything” A moment later Annabeth’s phone is ringing. Luckily The Boy must be listening to some pretty loud music, because he doesn’t turn around.

“What do you want?” Annabeth hisses into the speaker as she rounds a corner. 

She can practically feel Silena’s eyes roll across the line. “You know perfectly well. Spill the beans.”

But Annabeth knows how to work her friends. Silena doesn’t like to be involved in gossip but she does like to  _ know _ . If Annabeth gives in right away she’ll end up giving up everything. And she doesn’t want that. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Silena, just as good, opts to freeze her out, letting Annabeth stew in silence. Boy does Silena know her well, she can’t bear it. “Fine.” She can imagine Silena pumping her fist on the piano bench in the music room. “Y’know how my dad made me go to the museum with him after school? Well I may have found somebody who seems interesting, and I might be following him around.”

Silena makes a sound that is somewhere between a squeal and a snort. “Annabeth Chase: the stalker.”

“It’s not stalking! I’m just following him a bit.”

“Uh-huh. Well now that you’ve come clean, I’ve got to get back to C.”

Now it’s Annabeth’s turn. “Uh-huh.” She drags the last syllable out longer than Silena had, with a knowing glint in her eye that she hopes Silena can see across the river and a smirk she hopes Silena can hear.

“Bye Annabeth.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey y'all, the end of the first arc is coming up which means I've been reformatting the upcoming chapters, you might have noticed that the chapter count changed to 47 or that there were a few changes to the previous chapters (not big, you don't have to re-read). Don't worry, this is just to insure that the quality stays good, and I might add some later if needed. 
> 
> One more announcement, the chapter after this will also be from Annabeth's POV. (You'll get two Percy's in a row too)


	7. October - Annabeth IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We got a character ~properly~ introduced, and some quality sibling stuff

Annabeth won’t say that following this boy has completely changed her life, because it hasn’t, but he does make some things easier. Like coming to the museum, which used to be something that she hated. It helps that he can be counted on being there every week day. She never goes on weekends, but it’s possible he goes then too. She kind of hopes he doesn’t. She hopes he has a life outside of the museum. It’s been a bit over a week, or maybe two, she hasn’t been paying too much attention to the days. 

Sometimes, like today, she doesn’t find him immediately. She’s noticed his patterns. How he does homework in that gallery where they first met, how some days he goes into the African Wing and completely disappears. Normally it’s pretty safe to bet that he’s in that European Paintings gallery, in fact that’s where she starts her trail most days. But she’s also learned that he can be unpredictable. 

Today he is proving difficult. It has been almost an hour since she arrived at the museum when she decides she needs a break. Well, she doesn’t exactly decide, it’s more like the universe decides for her. Or Luke.

“Hey! Annabeth.” He grabs her arm, pulling her out of the haze of thought. “What? You don’t have time to say hello to your favorite older brother figure.” 

Annabeth rolls her eyes. Luke has quite the ego, but she does too. It’s a miracle that they get along so well, normally people with god complexes are constantly competing.

“Wow. Giving me the silent treatment there, Chase.” 

“Oh shut up.”

“That’s more like it.”

“What do you want, Castellan.” She emphasizes his last name, knowing he hates being called by it.

“Oof. Straight to the heart there Annabeth.” He mimes being stabbed. “I’m just bored on shift, thought my favorite girl might have come to keep me company.”

“Unfortunately I’m not here to keep  _ you _ company today.”

“But you are here for somebody?” He cocks one eyebrow, accentuating the scar on his right eye. It makes him look slightly crazy, like he could be a villain, but his eyes sparkle in the sunlight streaming through the clear ceiling and those thoughts slip her mind.

“No. Nope. I’m all by my lonesome.” She cringes at her choice of words.

“Uh huh.” He nods, exaggerating the motion.

“I should uhh, go find my dad.” She says, walking away backwards. She can hear Luke’s laugh and see his smirk. She deserves that, looking for her dad was a terrible excuse. She’d never seek him out on purpose.

Now that she’s back to wandering through the halls she’s trying hard to look like she’s not wandering. She doesn’t need some well meaning guard or guide starting a conversation with her. Out of the corner of her eye she sees a blur of black backpack. It’s the best lead she’s had all day, and she jogs to keep it in sight.

He’s turning left, rounding the corner, heading away from the photography exhibits. She finally catches up to him when he enters the Greek and Roman Wing. It seems like he had an actual destination in mind today, judging by the pace at which he walked here. She watches his posture soften as he tucks into one of the side galleries. 

Sitting on the bench his shoulders slump and he removes his phone from his pocket. It’s an old iPhone, at least three models behind the current version, which sits in her own pocket. In the next gallery over she sits on virtually the same bench. She watches him pull out his earbuds and methodically unwind them for much longer than necessary as she takes out her own. 

Sitting there like that, parallel to him, listening to music like he is, she feels connected. Not just to him and his physicality, but to what it must be like to be him. To sit in this museum day after day and play music and let the world melt away. To be at ease here, to belong here.

In theory she knows she belongs here. Her dad works here, she likes the building, she likes the people. But in the end she feels like she’s been shifted just out of alignment. Her dad works here but she’s not close to him. The building is beautiful but she doesn’t truly understand it. The people are nice but she isn’t actually friends with them. Except for Luke.

He’s the thing that had brought her back, again and again. He isn’t close to her dad, and he doesn’t know the building, and he’s not particularly friendly with any of the other staff, but he seems okay with that. But now he isn’t bringing her back anymore. Maybe it’s how odd he looked today. Unnerved is the word she’d use for how he seemed earlier. He didn’t fit, but now it’s in an uncanny way.

She knows that sometimes he just gets like this. He’ll be out of phase with his life. That’s when his caring grasp becomes a grip, when his smile doesn’t reach his eyes, when his scar stands out. There’s probably a reason, but he doesn’t talk about it. He probably ignores it, like she does. 

The Boy had seemed pretty settled in this gallery, but before she knows it he’s standing up and heading to the statue garden. She’s walking a few paces behind him when for the second time today she is stopped. This time by her father’s torso.

“Ah, Annabeth, there you are. We have to go home.”

“I was actually about to--”

“Sorry. Helen really wants me home now.”

As he puts his hand on her shoulder and guides them down to the parking garage she chooses to ignore how he said  _ me _ instead of  _ us _ . It’s not a surprise really. Helen doesn’t like her, and Helen doesn’t want her. Over the years it’s only increased the distance between her and her father. The changes in his phrasing only makes the change between the two of them more apparent.

“Thank Christ you’re home!” Helen says as they enter the house, hugging Frederick tightly.

“Is everything alright my dear?” 

“I’m having such a terrible time with the twins. I think I just need some support.” Annabeth wants to throw up a little as she watches them kiss. Helen must be pretty upset if she said Christ though, she’s not big on swearing, and she’s an avid church goer.

“What are they doing?” Annabeth asks, just to get them to stop, she should’ve known that would be a mistake.

“Oh, Annabeth, you’re home.” Helen doesn’t even try to hide the way her voice falls flat on Annabeth’s name, but Annabeth is determined not to stoop to her level. Her father must have heard Helen’s tone. If she can just keep herself together he’ll realize how bad Helen really is.

“Yes, I am.” Annabeth responds, with a tight lipped smile. The three of them stand there awkwardly for a moment.

“What’s wrong with the boys?” Frederick asks finally, and Helen turns to him brightly. Oh great, she’ll answer him, but not her.

“They won’t clean their room, and it’s horrible in there. There are toys all over the floor and their beds are unmade, but they just won’t do it. I said no dessert, but they don’t seem to care.” 

Annabeth, tired of the conversation, goes up the stairs. After dropping her things off in her own room she peaks in on Bobby and Matthew’s. Helen wasn’t wrong. There are legos everywhere, crayons and pencils scattered on their desks, papers on the floor. The two of them are on their respective beds, each on a DS.

“Your mom wants you to clean your room.” She says, monotone from the doorway.

“No.” Matthew responds from his bed, the farthest of the two.

“She says no dessert.”

“We can just steal cookies from the cupboard later tonight.”

She can’t argue with that reasoning. Despite her problems with Helen, she actually likes the boys. They’re funny. And smart. And they drive Helen up the wall sometimes, which is a bonus. Being half related to them helps her feel better about only checking on them occasionally. She knows she should do it more.

“If you do, I’ll give you candy from my secret stash and play Mario Kart with you.”

“Really?” Bobby asks, looking up from his game. She nods, and they both leave their beds and start picking things up.

In her own room Annabeth slides against the back of the door. The sun must’ve set on the drive home, and the only thing lighting her room is the purple sky coming through her window, leaving her room dark. She shoves around some of the dirty clothes on her floor and scrounges under her bed for a pencil. The lamp on her desk turning on only reveals her own unmade bed and a bunch of crumpled papers. Resigned to doing her homework on the floor, she leans against her bed frame.

“Dinner time.” Helen says as she opens Annabeth’s door. The sharp yellow light from the lamp only succeeds in causing greater contrast to Hellens features, turning her sour expression to daggers. “You know, the boys cleaned their room.” Helen purses her lips and looks distastefully at the clothes spilling out of Annabeth’s dresser, before shutting the door again

“I’ll be down in a minute.” Annabeth’s words stand stark in her empty bedroom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next two updates are Percy! We're getting so close to the end of this arc and I'm so excited but maybe thats just because I've written ahead. I hope you enjoyed this!


	8. October - Percy IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's something- or someone- just out of his line of sight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No trigger warnings

Homework is immensely stressful, which seems impossible because they are only five weeks into the semester. It’s not even that there is a lot of it. It’s completely manageable, but his brain just does not want to cooperate. It’s something akin to pulling a thread from a skein of yarn, but instead of unraveling neatly it’s just turning into a big knotted mess.

He can already feel irritation growing in the back of his mind, which is infuriating because there is nothing in particular causing it. Everything just feels incredibly heavy. Even his body feels tired and slow, more so than it had been throughout this impossibly long day. He can imagine how it feels to be a portable charger. Energy seems to be seeping out of his body, and nothing is coming in.

He’s been at the museum, and more particularly in the homework gallery, for almost three hours when out of the corner of his eye he spots the blonde girl. That’s the final straw. He’s going to implode if he has to go back to the apartment without a chance to decompress. He might make a mistake that will land him in hot water, and he can’t afford that, on the street or inside.

Trying not to seem too huffy or angry, he packs up his bag. His hands are stiff and trembling slightly with the force in which he is putting things away. The only solution to feelings like this is going to the Arts of Africa, Oceana, and the Americas wing. Although only tour guides call it that

This wing is probably the place Percy most feels at home. It’s a big space, but small compared to all of the other museum wings, probably due to the racism of the board members. But when it comes down to it, it’s the space where Percy is most comfortable.

Really, there are underlying issues for some of the reasons he likes it, but he pretends not to think about those. First of all, it receives far less traffic than almost any other part of the museum. He’s been able to sit there without seeing another person for hours. It has a very different feel than all of the other rooms. It seems like a place where he  _ belongs _ . Sometimes he can even exist there without the stereotypes and biases that others carry. He can exist there without feeling pressured into getting good grades or proving his worth. Not that he does either of those things particularly well.

Maybe it’s because this is the only part of the museum that holds even the smallest fraction of his ancestral home land. A place he’s never visited and knows unfortunately little about. Maybe because all of these oceans and all of this time between him and his dad doesn’t feel so large here.

His mom doesn’t talk about his father much. He doesn’t think it’s because of lack of want, per se. She seems to hold a certain bittersweet attitude towards him, laced with both love and sorrow. 

When he was younger and home from school Sally and him would take long walks at night. It was just as equal an opportunity for Sally to escape the apartment as it was for Percy to get his energy out. They would walk along the Harlem River until Sally reached a spot she liked, a lookout or a pier or a dock, and they would stand next to each other looking out over the water. 

In the moonlight her face would adopt something soft and wistful. He could see age lift off of her until she was eighteen again. Maybe she would talk about her family, maybe his dad. He could believe that she was reliving those happy memories when she talked about them, the way her hands would fly as she recalled a joke, or how she would smirk when she remembered something stupid that his dad did. 

The circumstances of his parents' separation is blurry in Sally’s stories. Maybe she suppressed the memories, maybe she doesn’t like thinking about it. There were never many details the few times he asked. “He left Percy, family or something, he got on a boat and went back to Africa.”

He tries not to be bitter about that, the vagueness. His mom must know just how big Africa is. It’s an entire continent. Maybe his dad doesn’t live anywhere near water. Maybe Percy’s fantasy is so far from reality that learning the truth would crush him. For all he knows, his dad is dead. He pushes that back too, like the bitterness.

After a while Percy stopped asking about his dad, he would never do something that so clearly brought his mother pain. But in this room he can imagine that possibly, all these oceans away, his dad is standing on a beach somewhere, looking out over the sea, thinking of  _ him _ . 

Normally he might tuck himself into a corner of the African Art Gallery, but today even it’s homey feelings are suffocating. He finds himself a bench in the southwestern most room. It’s parallel to where the Tomb of Perneb is, which he supposes is appropriate. People commonly refer to this wing as the African Wing, even if he’s sitting in the Pacific Islands exhibit, and Egypt is part of Africa. 

Looking out the floor to ceiling windows a different feeling comes over him, one that he can’t quite place. His anger induced anxiety that had been superheating his body has left something new in its place. If he didn’t know better he’d say it was the cold outdoors bringing a brittle shiver to his bones, but it’s barely October, he knows it’s warm outside. 

He can’t help being uncomfortable at this sensation. He’s always been very in touch with his feelings, even if he hates them. Not being able to recognize whatever this is has him on edge. He closes his eyes and shoves his earbuds in before turning on an audio book,  _ Skywoman _ , hoping the information will provide enough stimulation to get him out of this funk.

When he opens his eyes again there is someone else in the gallery. He can see their shadow cast across the floor by the recess lighting. When he turns, it’s The Girl. He tries not to show how startled he is. She’s standing on the other side of a glass case, facing him, but lazily looking at some pottery. He gets off the bench as calmly as he can manage and exits the gallery. 

He settles again in the Abstraction gallery. After rewinding his book he sits again, facing a painting of… well he doesn’t know what, that’s the point isn’t it? His hands loosen the grip they had held the edge of the bench with, that is, until he hears footsteps. He tries to tell himself to calm down, it’s probably just a guard, and he knows most of the guards. Yet when the person rounds the partition, there she is again, the blonde girl. She’s looking down at her phone, but her eyes anxiously flit to him, revealing.

Usually, Percy’s good at being sneaky. Usually he can go unnoticed in a crowd, usually he can escape profiling, usually he can scale a fire escape and leave everybody else behind. In this room he feels trapped. Standing feels like a daunting task with the exhaustion seeping out of his bones. As he exits the gallery, and then the wing, and then the museum, he can feel how sluggish his movements are. 

Looking up at his apartment building, he can barely remember how he got there. His fingers press the buzzer, and he hopes that his mom is home. When no response comes he pulls his key out of his bag. The door clicks shut behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You have no ideas how much it peeves me that the MET isn't orientated around the four cardinal directions.
> 
> I've finally committed to an update schedule now that I've written a few chapters ahead. Peanut m&ms will be updating on Tuesday nights/Wednesdays (as it has for the past few weeks, honestly)


	9. A Former Sight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Much needed conversations, one avoided, one beginning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Trigger Warnings* - injury mention (but super casual)
> 
> \- I'm not marking it this time because it's just a few vague sentences so a summary would be worthless  
> \- Hello longer chapters

In history Percy gets sent out of his class for “creating a distracting learning environment for your peers” which is a nice way of saying that he was pen tapping so much he wasn’t working on the project. Unfortunately this provides him with more time to think about the very thing that had been distracting _him_ ; the blonde girl.

The thing is that it is particularly hard to think about anything that isn’t her. She seems to be impacting his life greatly. Yesterday evening she essentially chased him out of the museum with her aggressive stalking. The day before she had taken over his homework spot. And earlier in the week she had been sitting in _his_ normal corner of the greek wing. These were only recent examples, she had been at it for most of the previous weeks. 

One thought keeps resurfacing in his brain. _Is it possible that she has been following me from the very beginning?_ He’s talked about it with Nigel, but neither of them have a good theory on why she’s doing it. As Nigel pointed out, Percy can’t possibly be that great of a threat to the museum.

Nigel’s only other suggestion was that she has a crush on Percy, which consequently made both of them very uncomfortable. The string of expletives and denials that had spewed from Percy’s mouth was only contrasted by Nigel staring silently at the city lights, gripping the barred metal floor of the fire escape. Needless to say, Percy hadn’t brought it up again.

He could do what he has been doing, which is leaving, but he really doesn’t want to do that tonight. Last night, he had given in and returned to the apartment early. It had ended with losing all of his small savings and barricading himself in the bathroom long after Gabe’s poker buddies had left and Gabe had passed out on the couch.

Getting dressed and leaving for school early to avoid Mom was just another nail in the coffin. He stares down at his bruised knuckles as he thinks about this. One of his knuckles is split, covered with a hastily applied bandaid he had stolen from the nurses office. He’d iced them, of course, after Gabe had passed out. But so much time had passed that it didn’t do much but numb his hands.

The joints ache and release satisfying, if unsettling, pops when he flexes his fingers. One knuckle for Gabe, _crack_ . One for avoiding his mom, _crack_ . One for school _crack_ . One for the blonde girl, _crack_. Being tripped by Matt Sloan is a small price to pay for spending his lunch at the park. He sits on a bench, completely unprotected by trees or shade, and watches the windows of the neighboring building.

It’s one of those old buildings that’s been updated to still look like it hasn’t been, and not for historical accuracy, purely to look pretentious. Ivy climbs the brick walls winding its way around the small windows. He can’t see into most of them, they stand dark, staring back at him. There are Doric columns flanking the doorway, cheap looking things trying to emulate Greece. The door itself is what ruins whatever kind of cohesive vibe that the school was trying to put together. It’s thick, mottled, bulletproof glass with two security checkpoints. 

He can feel his face crack into a smile as a familiar flash of black hair opens the doors with far too much force. He’s barely stood up when Thalia finishes her journey down the short steps, racing towards him, tackling him in a hug. God, he’s missed her. She has that smell that is vaguely woodsy even though they live in the middle of the city, the one she bought new shampoo for, and she squeezes so hard, and it’s been so long since he got a proper hug. She yells “Cuzzz!” in his ear and he receives a mouthful of her hair trying to say hi, and she might be the closest thing he has to home.

After her fervent greeting they assume their normal positions on the bench. Thalia sits with poor posture but authority, kicking her feet at the grass. Her own school uniform, a red plaid skirt and navy polo, makes Percy smile. She’s always adding the most interesting things; trying to see how much she can get away with. Her own silent resistance against the school and her parents. She’s added several more safety pins to the column that holds two pleats together, and it looks like graphic pins have been added to the waistband. That, and a silver bomber jacket, departing from her trademark leather.

It hasn’t been so long that he doesn’t recognize the new jacket. He’s sure the other is stored away carefully after being replaced by this symbol of the gang she’s joined. _“It’s not a gang Percy, it’s a club.”_ There’s a new silver ring on her pinky, with an emblem that is too small for him to see from this distance, but he can only assume that she’s risen in the ranks once again. He realizes, belatedly, that he’s been looking at her for a while. Her own blue eyes are staring him down, and he coughs unsteadily under their gaze.

“What's up Percy? Or did you come to visit your best maybe-cousin just for fun?”

She knows he didn’t. He and Thalia have a relationship as complicated as a labyrinth. Meeting when she fell out of a tree was probably the smoothest part of their friendship. Twist, living across the street from each other. Turn, going to competing boarding schools. Twist, might be related. Turn, he’s expelled (again). It’s all vertigo inducing changes. Looking left and right only to realize that there are so many more directions. This is what defines the very nature of their relationship. Every meeting requiring hard choices. His choice, as it always is, is to keep things light hearted. 

“Just needed an escape.” His expression isn’t as bright as his tone. He stretches back on the bench, looking up at the crowded sky, waiting for the energy to exercise his smile.Thalia _hmms_ good naturedly. “What about you?”

“Well, dad made me start doing archery.”

“Really?” He looks towards her now, cracking something in between a smile and a look of disbelief. Sports were a hard topic in her family, he knew there had been several conversations about what is “acceptable for a young lady.”

“Yeah, it being a rich kid sport and all. I actually kind of like it though. Even if the competitive circuit is a little pretentious.” It might be pretentious, but there is no doubt in his mind that she is dominating it. Everything Thalia does she does at one hundred percent.

“So are you going to go to the Olympics or something?” He conjures an image in his mind. A long row of targets with a parallel row of women. Thalia in the foreground, drawing back the compound bow, an arrow flying true. She does that stupid victory dance she only does in private. Real-life Thalia grins.

“Maybe. Just so you could say you knew me when.” He knows that those are words he _will_ say. When she’s on TV, awards piling in her arms, he’ll look up from whatever counter he is wiping down and smile up at the screen and say ‘I know her.’ Even the thought of her success brings a warm feeling to his core.

This is the nice thing about being friends with Thalia. Yeah she can be very persistent, at times arrogant, but often, if he doesn’t want to talk she’ll just drop it. Not for all subjects though. He stretches his arms in front of him, pulling the muscles in his shoulders to let them air out. As he relaxes his limbs, ripping open what is apparently going to be his final packet of peanut m&ms, Thalia grabs his hand. 

“What is this?” Her voice is sharp and accusatory, one he hasn’t heard directed toward him since middle school during a series of prank wars. Candy spills out of the pouch and onto the bench. He snatches his hand away, scrambling to pick up the chocolate.

“Nothing.” If only his tone supported his words. He should be better at this by now. He shouldn’t need a warning in order to be good at lying. Yet another thing he’s bad at. Great.

She jumps onto the bench, boots crunching candy, gaining leverage and trying to grab his hand back. “That’s. Not. Nothing.” She grunts out.

“Really, it isn’t a problem.” But in his distraction she succeeds in catching her prize.

She already knew what it was, he could tell, but still she falls silent. She turns his hand over gingerly, he no longer attempts to pull it away. It wouldn’t do any good anyway. “Percy,” she whispers, looking up at him. _When did I get taller than her?_

“I’m fine, Thals.” A nickname he only uses in moments like these. Soft and delicate and vulnerable ones. This is a moment that doesn’t match the bright October sun, but the atmosphere around them has shifted to something fragile. They are in their own little bubble, and if he says the wrong thing glass will fall onto him. The m&ms are on the ground, he notes dejectedly.

“What happened?” Her words rise out of their whisper. The authority that has been bred and grown over the years echoes in the background. He pulls his hand back, fiddling with one of the bandaids. It’s fraying badly, like all the others, but he won’t stop until they fall off.

“I got back early, he didn’t like that. Long story short I accidentally threw a punch and I’m short twenty bucks.” It’s not lying, it’s selective truth. He can imagine Mom rolling her eyes at him and ruffling his hair if he said that to her. The same way he could tell that Thalia already knew something was wrong with his hand, he can tell she doesn’t think he’s being untruthful. 

“You good?” Her tone is trying hard to be casual, but it just doesn’t sit right with the way she’s looking at him. He knows that she’s never liked how at peace he is with the whole situation. If she knew everything it’d probably be worse, which is why she doesn’t know everything.

“I’m great Thalia.” He ignores that his brain has been screaming at him since she came down the steps. Saying that Mom hugged him yesterday and he shouldn’t think that Thalia’s was better. Saying that just because Thalia was so visibly happy to see him doesn’t mean Mom isn’t. Saying that being at home with Thalia is a betrayal to his mom. He flashes a grin and twirls his pen around his fingers. That always gets a rise out of her, she hates that she can’t do it.

“Good.” Apparently it’s not working today, or somehow she can see through his tactic, because she pulls a fifty out of her wallet and presses it into his hand. He stares at it dumbly for a moment, his brain trying to catch up.

“Thalia, no.”

“It’s child support.” 

He rolls his eyes. She’s utterly unbelievable. And so ballsy too. After three years he’d think she’d know better than trying to give him money. Still, he humors her. “From my cousin?”

“No, from your uncle.” She says it matter-of-factly, but there is a tinge of rehearsed-ness to it. Like she’s practiced it in the mirror. “Parents aren’t the only ones who can pay child support.”

“You sure about that?”

“Positive.”

He tucks the gift back into her wallet. He’s not in the business of taking charity, even if it is from somebody who might be a relative. He can get out of this himself when he needs to. Right now he doesn’t need to. And he definitely doesn’t need her help.

Thalia just grumbles for a moment. “Well, my lunch is up, so I guess I should be going back inside.” They’ve been talking for all of five minutes. This is a blatant lie, but she’s never cared much for pretenses. As she’s passing his side of the bench she drops the bill. “Ooh, look Percy. Fifty dollars.”

“Thalia!” He yells, but it’s too little too late, she’s sprinting inside the building.

* * *

Percy has been evading this girl for the past half hour. He’d expect that she’d get tired of following him at some point. He hasn’t been making it easy for her. He knows the public section of the museum like he knows the subway system, that is to say well. But she just won’t give up, and with the African wing compromised he has nowhere to hide. 

It’s nearly seven, the museum has stopped accepting visitors and more and more people are departing, leaving most halls and exhibits empty. His footsteps echo on the floor as he speeds through the hall, heading for the Temple of Dendur.

Ascending the steps quickly he tucks into the reconstructed ruin, hoping to become completely out of sight. His breathing is normal, he’s not scared. He’s just annoyed. He looks at the hieroglyphs, trying to remember the few that he had learned from that boy across the river. 

Deciding to sit by the reflection pool he exits the temple. Out of the corner of his eye he catches a black and blue blur and turns the fastest he has in his entire life. He shouldn’t be surprised, but it takes him a second to catch his breath.

He holds intense eye contact with the girl, the type he uses to keep older kids away from him. It’s effectiveness varies greatly, sometimes aggravating bullies, sometimes pushing them away. The girl folds a little and if he wasn’t upset that she was afraid of him he’d grin. The feeling doesn’t last long though, because she straightens and meets his gaze.

He can feel anger bubbling in his gut. All he wants to do is be able to spend his free time here _freely_ , and she has been ruining that for weeks. She’s aloof with Loretta and talks to guards whenever he’s around. He can feel the venom in his veins and it’s crawling its way into his voice but he doesn’t have the temperament to beat it back. He doesn’t care right now, he will slice this girl with his words.

“Do you think I’m going to steal something?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh what's this? An actual chapter title? Yes. The chapters starting with this one are going to be a little longer. Unfortunately the next chapter might be out a little bit later, it's a really important chapter and is proving very difficult to write, so I wan't to make sure it's good.
> 
> Edit 02/28/21: The next chapter will be out on time


	10. I'm Still Learning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annabeth: mind blank, thoughts full

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- no trigger warnings  
> \- last chapter of part one  
> \- I feel like my writing is getting a bit better? The chapters are getting longer at least because there's more I can do.

“Do you think I’m going to steal something?”

_ Huh? _ With a gush of air Annabeth feels like her mind exits her body.  _ Is this what blacking out feels like? _ It can’t be, because she can still see. More exactly, she can see him. One hand curled in a fist around his backpack strap, the other outstretched in a questioning gesture.  _ Why is he talking to me? _

It’s been a long time since she heard him speak. Since she heard him whisper “¿Mamá?” into his phone. Since she heard French echoing in the gallery. And maybe hearing him speak two other languages is not the best way to gauge what his voice sounds like, but does it really matter? She knows it sounds nice. 

“What. Do. You. Want.” He says painfully slow, but she’s not attaching his words to her. They float in space listlessly.  _ He can’t be talking to me. We can’t be having a conversation. _ She swims in time like the mesmerizing way that light moves when reflected on a chlorine pool. His voice is home-y. She can tell that he, like Silena, has a wide range of tone and pitch. And for some reason that is comforting. She can’t place why.

There is something ever so slightly off about his voice. She can feel her fingers twitch by her side. But the knowledge that her body does that when something is wrong isn’t enough to clue her in on  _ what _ is wrong. Her brain is still fuzzy with the realization that they are talking, it’s almost as if they are on opposite sides of a window. She knows there is something deeply wrong with how he is speaking, how he is standing, how he is looking at her, but it just won’t click into place. Here is this person in front of her who she doesn’t–who she shouldn’t–know well enough to tell that something is different, yet she can. “Fucking Christ.”

Only then does his question register. What does she want? _To be friends? To go to a time before he noticed me?_ Either of those options sound good but neither sit right with her. Maybe it’s because she now can see how each of his words waver with heat. Briefly she speculates about the capabilities of his voice. His volume has risen, refusing to be a shout but still cutting her like one. Still, his swearing makes a small smile overcome her previously frozen features. She thinks of Helen, who would have a heart attack if she heard that four letter word adjacent to the lord’s name.

“You must be crazy.” Apparently now is the time her brain has chosen to shake off whatever had come over her. She can feel every muscle in her body,  _ burning _ to do something. Anything. But she doesn’t know what or why. She has moved through this interaction in an unaware state of bliss. Now all of these things she normally would’ve picked up on are crashing around her. The flex of his fist. The venom of his voice. The enmity in his eyes. She can no longer avoid the bite that his words have. 

“Do you have any idea what you’re doing to me?” What does he mean  _ ‘What she’s doing to him?’ _ She hasn’t spoken to him. She hasn’t touched him. He hadn’t even known that she existed until a few minutes ago. There is poison in his mouth and it stings. She sees how his knuckles turn white on his backpack strap and his other hand drops in frustration.

“You have the audacity to follow me around, always watching. You talk to guards when I’m around. You’re always lurking just around the corner. I mean come on.” She has existed, she’s existed to him for a long time. He sounds tired and annoyed and  _ bitter _ . And angry. She can’t ignore the anger clear in every line of his body. A deep, simmering anger, that has built up over time. All directed at her. 

“Do you know how difficult it is to find a place that feels safe? I know it’s not perfect, but still! I’ve spent a year getting to know the staff, a year becoming comfortable enough where I know that some random racist asshole can’t just kick me out whenever they want, because the guards all know me. They know I’m not here to do anything bad. Why should I have to prove it to some nosey white girl?”

_ Racist? _ Hold on. He can’t– He doesn’t think that– Oh God. What has she done? She still hasn’t spoken, her mind strings together every explicative she’s ever heard and a special type of mortification makes its home in her chest. The infinite time she lounged in earlier is now crashing about her. And she is stuck there. Feet glued to the sandstone blocks beneath them. Her body is still shouting at her, even more urgently than before:  _ Do something! Move. Speak. Run. Anything! _ But she can’t.

“Do you know how crazy it is to report someone to a guard just because they are sitting on the floor? Out of the way, at that.” She struggles to recall that moment; the second time she saw him. Pulled in by a guard, stuck in a boring conversation, catching a glimpse of him. Her posture straightened, wanting to make a good impression, putting more effort into the conversation. She wants to run. More than she wants her mothers approval. More than she wants her fathers love. Her reflexes, built over years of being left and lied to and forgotten and ignored, tell her to leave. To never come back to the museum. To never see this boy again. 

He continues to speak but she feels like she is on the other side of that window yet again. It’s not comforting this time. He keeps talking but his voice blurs. Alarms blare in her brain. Her heart aches. Damage control. That’s what she needs to do. No matter how much she wants to run, she  _ needs _ to fix this. Never has she wanted to fix something so much. 

Her mouth opens and closes a few times. She registers that he’s staring at her, unspeaking, glaring. “I–” But her voice gives out as suddenly as it started. He sends another glare her way, and this time it stings, like lemon juice in a papercut, except her whole body is covered in papercuts. The reality of what she’s done settles heavy around her shoulders. With a dejected sigh he walks away leaving Annabeth standing there looking out the wall to wall windows as the one-in-a-million October rain comes down on the grey city.

* * *

“Annabeth! Annabeth! We’re going out!” It’s Bobby’s voice that carries down the back staircase and through the living into the kitchen, but Annabeth doesn’t care enough to respond. She continues to gaze mindlessly out the window. Outside she can hear one of their cars start up.

“Annabeth?” Bobby enters the kitchen clumsily. His sneakers are half on and he stumbles over himself as he goes to join Annabeth at the breakfast table, suddenly subdued.

“You’re acting weird.”

“Yeah, well…” She doesn’t finish the sentence, but that doesn’t deter Bobby.

“You’ve been quiet all week. And not your normal angry quiet.” Annabeth barely has time to realize that somehow her half-brother knows that she has different types of quiet before he asks her what’s wrong. 

Annabeth struggles for words. How does she explain that she did something wrong? That she hurt someone? That she hurt someone that she doesn’t even know and she can’t stop thinking about it. Those ten minutes have been playing on loop in her mind. Whenever she tries to sleep she relives it. How does she tell an eleven year old that she had to put on foundation today to hide the dark circles under her eyes? She settles on “I made a mistake.”

“Oh, that’s all?” 

“That’s not ‘all’. I hurt someone.”

Bobby just rolls his eyes. “If you make a mistake you fix it and apologise Annabeth.” He says it as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “There’s all these stupid quotes hung up in my classroom, and they’re stupid, but there’s this one:  ‘ Mistakes are a fact of life. It is the response to error that counts.’”

Bobby stands from the bench, his raincoat swishing as he moves. “You make a mistake, you make up for it, dummy.” He flicks her forehead but she decides to ignore it. “That’s how you grow. Every kindergartener knows that.”

The horn of the car goes off a few times and she hears the front door slam behind Bobby as he dashes outside, leaving Annabeth alone in the house with this new information. Suddenly she can’t believe that she’s spent the week just stewing on the disaster that was her museum visit on Wednesday. 

Recounting her history, when she is faced with a mistake she barrels right through, leaving it behind. The advice  _ she _ remembers from kindergarten was to forget about your mistakes because everyone else would, they weren’t worth the guilt. But maybe she took that advice too quickly. She can’t remember ever trying to make up for the bad things she’s done. 

_ “That’s how you grow.” _ Bobby’s words ring in her head. She must have missed that lesson in school. She can’t remember a time she’s tried to be a better person than she is.

He’s right. This  _ mistake _ of hers, for lack of a better term, has been haunting her. More than anything she’s messed up on before. Maybe there are mistakes you ignore, but there are also mistakes that you can’t. This is one that she can’t.

Before she can talk herself out of it she pulls a piece of paper out of the stack by the printer and grabs one of her father’s fountain pens off the kitchen island. Carefully she divides the paper into two columns with the dark ink. The blankness of the paper feels vaguely threatening, the knowledge she has of this boy she’s collected over the weeks feels tarnished by her behavior. She shakes a shiver off her spine. This is something that she has to do. This is how she un-sticks herself from school problems, this is the only way she knows how to even begin to fix this mess.

Switching between the columns she writes everything she knows about the boy and every way she messed up. She replays his words in her head, citing examples, trying to reach the root of the problem. She writes down things she doesn’t know, things she needs to know.

Some things hurt to put on paper. She writes that she followed him and the ink smudges, staining her skin, but this is a small price to pay. Silena was right, Annabeth was stalking him. And in a twist that only she didn’t see coming, it blew up in her face. The strange urgency to solve this that she felt on that Wednesday night washes over her. She keeps writing.

_ “Known: speaks Spanish, learning French, spends a lot of time at the museum…” _

Her handwriting turns from the nice round letters she’s trained herself for back to the scratch that is her default setting as her writing intensifies. More questions pop up as she writes. How old is he? Where does he go to school? What’s his name? But those aren’t important.

It takes twenty minutes of furious writing and her hands becoming sticky with ink for her to slow down. She sits back and looks at the things she’s written. In science one of the most important things is finding the right question. The question you need to answer, the question that fits the situation. Here, she doesn’t know what she doesn’t know and she doesn’t know which questions to ask. She needs a plan, but she doesn’t know what it should be. 

In an experiment you collect data to find the answer. Here is all this data, but she got it before she asked a question. She didn’t know there would have to be a question when this began. Frustration hits her like a brick wall but she refuses to spiral. She picks the pen back up,  _ no piece of data is too small. _ Pen meets paper.

_ “Known: likes peanut m&m’s” _

There’s a  _ click _ .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried my best and uh... this was the result. Anywayssss... I'm having a lot of fun writing chapter eleven (and twelve too), I might even say it's my favorite so far? This chapter was the last chapter of Part One, and kinda the start of part two? I didn't want the next chapter to be split povs so this is what ended up happening. There's a lot of fun stuff coming :)
> 
> If you want to hear more about it, I've been known to spoil stuff on [my tumblr](https://chart-of-stars.tumblr.com)
> 
> Also! If y'all have ideas for social media handles/discord names for the characters please put them in the comments. Chapter 11 has some fun stuff going on and I'm going to be incorporating some new stuff because a lot of Percy's interactions with his friends are through the internet.


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